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Memory Keeper’s Daughter

Sharpie Squad member and photographer, Hanna Agar, is a Brooklyn babe hailing from the amazing cheese state and is making her mark and making memories in the Big Apple, all with a little help from Sharpie.

Hanna Agar ladies and gents!

I have been kind of obsessed with thinking about memory. How we deal with memory. How we interact with our memories. How we hold onto them. How we yearn sometimes to be rid of certain memories that persist in haunting us. How we lose memories. When I was 14 my grandfather died of Alzheimer’s and the last few years of his life he couldn’t remember who I was anymore. By the end my grandmother was the only person who he seemed to recognize. It is really scary and sad to think about all of those amazing memories fading away. My grandfather was a cartoonist, a photographer, and a writer and I think I take after him in many ways. I wish that I could have had the chance to get to know him better, but I was too young to understand what was being lost.

"Memory Keeper"

Memory Keeper is an image I created with my grandfather in mind. Imagine if every memory that has been lost is collected somewhere. Somewhere these memories are building up, piling up, layer upon layer. There is a little clerk sitting behind a desk as these memories come pouring in. He is trying to organize them for us in case some day we want them back. He sits there year upon year as the lost memories pile up. He knows how valuable these memories are. He wants to keep them safe for us. He wants them to be recorded, to be sorted, to be stored, to be saved. For this shoot I had friends email me with memories that they would not want to lose and these I recorded with Sharpies onto rolls of receipt paper.

Some people become trapped in their memories. They become obsessed and entangled in a web of words and thoughts and images.

"Memory Trap"

"Memory Trap 2"

Some people become lost in the nostalgia of the past. They romanticize their memories and live in this state of feeling and yearning for their “better” past. They are adrift in this unmoving dream world, so focused looking behind them that they fail to see that they have stopped moving forwards.

"Nostalgia"

We can store knowledge in our memory library. We can absorb new ideas and thoughts from an early age to shape us and shape the world around us. We can use our memories and our knowledge to teach others and create new things.

"Reading Room"

Not all of my images are memory related. Many are formed from an idea of a story or are inspired from a painting or song or theater experience. Sometimes I will see a location that strikes me in some way and I try to develop a story around my reaction.

"The Journey"

"Summer Sledding"

As a little update since my last blog, I have now been living in Brooklyn, NY for almost a year and a half. I am working for fashion, beauty, and celebrity photographers as an assistant, digital tech, and retoucher.

Oh Hanna, you continue to stun me. Your drive to express yourself artistically is really something to behold. Beautiful. I hope that you draw professional interest from this and move to bigger heights. Love Tamar

HEY HANNA: WHAT A JOY TO SEE YOUR NEW SHARPIE MAGNUM OPUS. there will be more to come, I know. I only use my Sharpie to pen in import’t dates on the Calender…but even that doesn’t help me remember them all, speaking of MEMORIES.